Peoria Turkey Trot: Reality Sets in.

Back in 1996, during my first full year of running, I did this course in 29:14 (“almost” 4 miles) A few weeks earlier, I did a 3 miler in just under 21 minutes.

This year, my 3 miler (same course in 1996) was just under 24 minutes (23:38). This year’s Turkey Trot: 32:43. In other words, by “3 mile to this course” ratio hasn’t changed much at all; in fact, the ratio (T(Turkey Trot)/T(Bradley 3 mile)) is about the same for both years.

Still, I had hoped that I had improved a bit more than that.

The day: couldn’t have been better for this time of year; dry, sun, light wind, low 40s. There was lots of very cute spandex too!

The course starts with about .2 miles on a slight incline (on the road) and then you make a hard right turn up a big hill. You go up, up, level off, come down (all in the first mile) then up, up again, down a bit, up, down a bit then up. Then you have a steep drop to the beginning of the loop (about 2.7 miles); in all you’ve had 400 feet of climb and 800 feet of elevation change.

Then you do the out leg that you started with but instead of turning right, you turn left onto the grass and follow the boundary of some soccer fields for about 1000-1200 meters.

The course is slightly short but your time will be about your flat 4 mile time (due to the elevation changes and grass).

I found myself taking it easy going up with the idea of “floating” on the back stretch and “kicking” on the home stretch.

I did lose some ground and was unable to make it up; I ended up racing this young woman and she got away from me in the home stretch.

When I finished, I was wiped out; this was not an easy effort.

My buddy Tracy did fine, winning 3rd in the female 55 and up age group.

Afterward, we went out for pizza and conversation.

So overall, it was a fine time, though it is tough to face reality: I’ve made substantial progress but I’ve got a long, long way to go to make it “all the way” back.